Hell is other people
by Zenzao
Summary: With Voldemort long gone, Harry Potter has one last duty inherited from his late headmaster to fulfill. But throughout the world, old, slumbering forces are stirring, and history may repeat itself after sixty years of disgrace. Even if Harry completes his task, he'll be faced with new enemies and new allies and a side of magic that he hardly knew about. Rating may change in future.


_Ungrateful sots_. Malcolm Grimm plastered a smile to his shaggy features as the dysfunctional crowd at his back reunited on the edge of the Black Forest. This was the time to shine, the moment to lay it on thick after an hour of history that he might finally convince the unruly masses to part with a little of their less-than-precious silver and copper.

"If I could say a final word, my lads and lasses, encroachment is eating away at the very nature we have toured together." For a beat their feet slowed as they passed him by, heads craning about to face the elderly tour guide again. "Soon there will be no forest for our generation to behold, to say nothing of our children and grandchildren's. A small contribution-" and then the moment was gone, the muggles dispersing like the shadows of night at a cloudless dawn's approach.

Malcolm grit his teeth at their backs and swore to himself. _Bastards_! _Every one of you_ , _a blight upon your heads_! If he used just a little of the family magicks he could see them stricken with one of the good old ailments, oh how easily he could do it, his fingers already twitching with the urge to work up some long simmering spell...

 _But no_ , he reasoned moodily, and caught himself before he made a mistake.

And there could be no doubts that it _would_ be a mistake. Muggle culture had advanced too far since those bygone days when a curse could be laid with indiscretion. They had ready access to too many and too knowledgeable doctors, who would just as soon exorcise with a snick of the scalpel as cure such maladies at his disposal.

He'd need to really invest in the cursing to get around all of their miraculous methods, and then like wildfire a rumor would spread about an illness in the forest, and soon he'd have the government poking even deeper in with every tour he processed, if they even allowed him to continue operating.

Those in power so adored threatening his legacy as it was.

At best, the folk would just stop coming, and where would that put him and his ancestors after six generations tethered to this forsaken forest? He grunted to himself at the injustice of it all. In his father's day information and sights cost more than just a pretty penny to the entrance fees... but such was the present state of affairs. Maybe the next tour in the evening hours would recoup his hassles, though he doubted it.

Just as Malcolm had written the latest affair off as a waste and began to work over in his head how better to voice his request, as even open _suggestion_ laced into his speech was denied him by the laws, there came a sudden _clink_ of coins. In a beat his hairy ears perked as the donation box next to his cabin rattled with the thick, heady clunk of true, precious _gold_ , a rich cadence which warmed his greedy little heart after all of these years going without.

"Ah, I cannae thank ye enough," he began with a lapse into more comfortable speech, and when he turned he found the generous and lagging donor to be a boy of less than twenty seasons standing there with naught but a plain leather wallet in one hand and a coin the size of a ripe apple in the other.

 _Now what is this_?

Before Malcolm's glittering gaze that coin slid impossibly into the donation slot, meant for pocket change and at most folded dollars. A coin as large as what he had just seen had no right to violate the laws of nature as it had, and at once Malcolm felt the hairs on the back of his arms and his neck begin to stand upright.

He took a reluctant whiff of the air between them. Oh, he had already known that gold was real, yes, that had never been in doubt, but underneath that precious aroma came a scent more vague and aloof and altogether alien from the _plainness_ which muggles kept.

The boy slid the last coin in with a resounding clatter and then he stepped back with a flourish, spun to face Malcolm, and extending his forward leg he bowed from the hip. Malcolm squinted at the antiquated greeting and reluctantly followed suit, as honor dictated that he must.

Then the boy said, "My thanks for the tour, Mister Grimm. I could almost say it was the same as my Headmaster spoke of, except that we could hardly stray off of the beaten path with so many other guests."

Malcolm lifted his head at the same time that the boy did, and their eyes locked. Such a piercing green stared back, like the Irish fields awash with stars instead of blades of grass. And _then_ he knew what was so wrong about this scene before him, what had been tickling at the back of his mind.

Those were _wizard's_ eyes.

 _By_ Mab _, an actual wizard in the flesh, young though this one is!_ His shoulders bunched up uncomfortably as he broke gaze and settled upon the faded scar just there above the round spectacles. "What do you want, boy?"

The wizard smiled a genteel smile that offered no affront at Malcolm's sudden tone and said, "I'd like an extended tour. The kind your father Harwin once administered for my Headmaster during the great war."

Now Malcolm rubbed his fingers together, working up a quick sizzle. He waited until the last rumble of a diesel engine at his back had passed out of earshot, and then the glamour concealing his identity from the muggles rippled and regressed. Vibrant auburn hair replaced the patchy gray under his cap, his pale skin darkening, and if he'd had a mirror before him, he would have seen the aurora glowing within his eyes to wash out the cataracts.

Yet as he crouched down into a stance of defense, the years _were_ most apparently on him, only made worse by a sickness from his childhood treated almost-too-late by a wizard alchemist, and his springy bones gave a dry creak to warn him off of any enthusiastic motions.

"And I want all the treasure stolen from us over the generations, boy. _That_ tour is not for anyone, even if your governments hadn't forbidden some fun by the time that I took over."

The wizard gave no sign of discomfort at his true form, and then had the gall to laugh, as if Malcolm had been making a lighthearted jest. It was the most common thing, and Malcolm found no comfort in the noise. When the fit of odd humor had subsided the boy replaced his wallet into the pocket of his thin black jacket and held up the last coin concealed in the palm of his hand.

All it took was a glance to confirm every wariness was due this boy wizard, for on that coin served an ancient emblem of overlapping cloak, wand, and stone.

"I know what I am doing, Mister Grimm." And then the boy wizard chanted a peculiar phrase, Latin interspersed with heavier German, and the coin glowed like a hot coal in his grip as an answering phrase appeared in a twining loop across the surface, _Hallowed be He who carries this burden_.

Malcolm hadn't heard nor thought of that that phrase in decades. He shivered as a memory of a far gone cool spring struck him all of a sudden, seeing a tall, cloaked man in midnight blue, a man with an auburn beard going to gray at the edges and a weighted gaze with all the worlds' concerns apparent on his mind, that very same coin carried in hand, yet still the wizard had had the time to spare for an ill fae child.

This boy wizard was worse than any government trouble. Far, far worse.

"Say that you do," the half-leprechaun stalled as he shook himself back to the present. "To what purpose would you walk amidst that path to ruin?"

A glint of steel edged into those fierce eyes, though the wizard still smiled when he answered, "To return a gift passed into my care some time ago. It has never really suited my needs, and I find that old problems require older solutions."

Malcolm grimaced. Persuading the boy by words alone was futile, and for just a moment, he wondered about putting a _compulsion_ to leave the matter be.

But even as his fingers began to twitch for only the third time in several years, he suddenly remembered what his father had told him when he was still just a wee lad. _Ne'er hex a wizard, Mal, eer, else twice th' misfortune reflected upon ye_. This boy looked like one who could beat his _compulsion_ readily.

 _I don't see any two ways about this, then._

While he worked through his thoughts, the wizard simply flicked the ancient token into the air and caught it again across the knuckles of his right hand, walking the glowing relic slowly back and forth, and repeated when it reached the beginning. The sight was just as unnerving as that out of place laugh had been.

"Put that away for now, wizard. I'll take you off of the beaten path, aye. Tonight. After the last of the muggles have their fill of disappointing me."

And like that the steel was gone from those unnatural eyes. "Of course. I just wanted to be sure you were capable of following through, given our _present day_ circumstances." And the token vanished back into his pocket the same as his wallet, and the wizard added, "I'll see you at nine, Mister Grimm." Then the wizard marched out past the edge of the forest over the tarmac, and with hardly a passing glance across the empty lot, he vanished with a startling _crack_! into thin air.

When the boy had gone a new, gruff voice spoke up for the first time. "Some kid, eh? Twisted you up in _honor_ and _obligation_ like a damned lawyer."

Malcolm looked over into the woods, and just there lurking in the shadows he found one of the many irritations responsible for his playing nice with the muggles. He was suddenly in no mood for _this_ distraction after the trip down memory lane. _Insufferable sot_ , he repeated his earlier condemnation by habit.

Yet nevertheless he gradually inclined his head in faux-respect toward the new voice. "Oh, aye, that he did." _And if he's worth his salt he'll handle you, too_. "Now, laddie, if you can't be sure I won't go breaking my oaths after such a disservice as today has been, what more will it take? My father's father and kin have kept their word all the way down to me, and I have no intention to break such longstanding good faith, so how about a good word with your higher ups to lighten this noose we've worn tight for so many generations?"

A hardy _creak_ preceded the click of a cigarette lighter igniting, and in the momentary pale glow yellow eyes glinted coolly above a cherry-red cigar tip.

"Yeah, sure, Grimm." A long drag, and on the exhale, "Soon as the old man gives the signal I'll hang this job out to dry like all the rest." Another puff, "'Till then get used to my presence hovering over your head like that old proverbial sword. Point of fact, why don't you get your surly ass over to your office and cuddle up with that gold while it's still in your possession. I'll put out a cancellation for the last public tour while I'm filing a report about your new riches and our guest."

The cigar and its owner wandered off into the forest, leaving Malcolm standing there like a fool. He ground his teeth and then swallowed his wounded pride for what felt the last time before he could suffer no more, and then he went to take care of business. There were actions to follow through on if he was to open up spiritual gates kept closed for several decades, and that bastard from the government apparently had no intention to stop him.

/END Chapter I.

* * *

A/N: This began as a one-shot concept for a crossover competition quite some time ago. The concept has gradually grown since then and I think I can swing it. I plan to incorporate something of the comics and the films together for this version of the Hellboy universe, which overlaps with the Potterverse.


End file.
